Hybrid electric vehicles (HEV) utilize a combination of an internal combustion engine with an electric motor to provide motive power. This arrangement provides improved fuel economy over a vehicle that has only an internal combustion engine. One method of improving the fuel economy in an HEV is to shutdown the engine during times that the engine operates inefficiently, and is not otherwise needed to propel the vehicle. In these situations, the electric motor is used to provide all of the power needed to propel the vehicle. When the driver power demand increases such that the electric motor can no longer provide enough power to meet the demand, or in other cases such as when the battery state of charge (SOC) drops below a certain level, the engine must start quickly and smoothly in a manner that is nearly transparent to the driver.
The HEV includes a battery management system that estimates values descriptive of the battery pack and/or battery cell present operating conditions. The battery pack and/or cell operating conditions include battery SOC, power fade, capacity fade, and instantaneous available power. The battery management system should be capable of estimating values during changing cell characteristics as cells age over the lifetime of the pack. For example, the calculation of power capability for a battery system may help prevent battery damage and/or other failure modes caused by over-charging and over-discharging. The precise estimation of some parameters will improve performance and robustness, and will ultimately lengthen the useful lifetime of the battery pack.